Tell Me about Rolemaster

[Rechan]

While I'm running a D&D game, a player is a veteran of Rolemaster and wants to start a rolemaster game during the week.

I've only been able to glean a few things from him and Wikipedia. Namely:

1) Once you finish character creation, it's just a roll of percentile dice + modifier = outcome to anything.
2) Charts for everything. EVERYTHING. Charts charts charts.
3) It's "realistic". For instance, while there are "Hit Points", most injuries come from a "Critical hit" table, and the degree of those injuries usually designate you dieing. And even a skipping stone can kill you with a lucky roll.
4) "Magic" is in three categories: Arcane, Mentalist, and Channeling.
5) You're just a vulnerable kitten without armor.

All of the above has me a bit wary, but I'm still curious, so I seek out you, the Enworld population.

Among a general "lay of the land" of Rolemaster, I do have two questions:
1) I'm interested in Mentalism, but I don't know what it can "do". Is it telekinesis, telepathy, can you do some sort of force-ninjitsu to be Neo, what? I'd enjoy something like a Jedi, or in D&D terms, a Monk/Psion. But I just don't know what the options Mentalism offers.
2) Aside from the three magics, and obviously "I'm a warrior with a sword", what other "Classes" or Archetypes does Rolemaster facilitate?

 

[Khairn]

While I'm running a D&D game, a player is a veteran of Rolemaster and wants to start a rolemaster game during the week.

I've only been able to glean a few things from him and Wikipedia. Namely:

1) Once you finish character creation, it's just a roll of percentile dice + modifier = outcome to anything.
2) Charts for everything. EVERYTHING. Charts charts charts.
3) It's "realistic". For instance, while there are "Hit Points", most injuries come from a "Critical hit" table, and the degree of those injuries usually designate you dieing. And even a skipping stone can kill you with a lucky roll.
4) "Magic" is in three categories: Arcane, Mentalist, and Channeling.
5) You're just a vulnerable kitten without armor.

All of the above has me a bit wary, but I'm still curious, so I seek out you, the Enworld population.

Among a general "lay of the land" of Rolemaster, I do have two questions:
1) I'm interested in Mentalism, but I don't know what it can "do". Is it telekinesis, telepathy, can you do some sort of force-ninjitsu to be Neo, what? I'd enjoy something like a Jedi, or in D&D terms, a Monk/Psion. But I just don't know what the options Mentalism offers.
2) Aside from the three magics, and obviously "I'm a warrior with a sword", what other "Classes" or Archetypes does Rolemaster facilitate?

Mentalism contains many different type of spell lists (mechanic for grouping similar types of spells) that include telekinesis, telepathy, mind control, chi, self healing, disguise and everything else in between. Casters who use this realm of magic are not as powerful as the elemental Essence casters, or the Channelers, but there are some very distinct advantages to it. Its subtle, requiring less hand waving and verbal chanting to maximize your spell effect. It also is less effected by the armor you wear, enabling you to become a solid hybrid class melee / caster such as the Magent (magical assassin type).

RM is very modular with LOTS of classes and character customization. I would say that almost any archtype is open to you. What type are you looking for?

I love RM and have played it on and off for over 15 years. Its flexibility has allowed me to fit it into every fantasy and sci-fi genre, which I love.

Its a hard game to enjoy if the GM does not know his stuff. But if your GM knows the rules, combat is easily as fast as D&D.

What more do you want to know?

 

[SableWyvern]

First, you'll need to be aware RM is deadly. Your level 40 fighter can be killed by a peasant child who gets a lucky swing in with his club. Unlikely, but always a real possibility.

Secondly, while RM does use an arcane power source, what you mention as arcane is actually essence (which maps to D&D Arcane). Arcane in RM is an add-on power source that combines essence, mentalism and essence (in different fashions, depending on the edition).

There are a fair number of charts -- one for each of the main weapons, and another ten or so for critical hits. If the GM/group is organised, the game still runs fairly quickly though.

Mentalism generally involves mental effects, and spells that effect the caster or a single target. A Monk character sounds right up your alley, and if the GM is using RMSS and the Martial Arts companion, there is a Mentalism using monk available. It's also pretty easy to shift the default Monk from essence to mentalism. Monks are semi-spell users, meaning that they are decent combatants and general skill users, which magic that enhances their mundane abilities. Monk spells tend to revolve around crazy athletic and movement abilities, as well as defence.

The classes (professions) in the RMSS core rules are as follows:

Arms
Fighter
Thief
Rogue (Fighter/Thief)
Warrior Monk (Martial Artist)

Channeling
Animist (nature priest)
Cleric
Ranger (traditional D&D ranger with more magic)
Paladin

Essence
Magician (wizard/elementalist)
Illusionist (conjures very real illusions)
Dabbler (Magic using Ninja/thief type)
Monk

Mentalism
Mentalist (Psion)
Lay Healer (Healer)
Bard
Magent (magic using assassin)

Hybrids
Healer (Channeling/Mentalism): Very potent self-healing abilities, and can take on the wounds of others.
Mystic (Essence/Mentalism): Illusions and information gathering
Sorcerer (Essence/Channeling): Destroy stuff with magic

 

[Rechan]

Interesting. Does the Monk do any sort of body augmentation ("Congratulations, you're bulletproof for the next ten seconds" "Tada, I can walk through fire by just harnessing my chi")? Yogi/Mythical Chinese Martial Artist type stuff?

I wonder how the mentalism-monk in the monk book functions. Do they augment their attacks with telekinesis? Heh.

I do not know if he has the Monk companion, but he does have [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Mentalism-Companion-Rolemaster-5605-Caldwell/dp/1558063803/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1217223425&sr=8-2"]this book[/ame], and (Well he said "Arcane book"; it could've been the Arcane or Essence companion).

Dabbler (Magic using Ninja/thief type)
Magent (magic using assassin)

What's the difference between these two guys? Because "magic using assassin" sounds really similar to "Magic using ninja", y'know? Both sound fairly appealing to me.

Mystic (Essence/Mentalism): Illusions and information gathering

Is this the "Speak to the dead, read tarot cards" type of "Information gathering", or something else? I always thought the "Medium" or Psychic type of magic user was a niche really missing from D&D.

I notice there's no "Necromancer" or Voodoo Priest/Hexer. "Debuff" casters are appealing to me, but not to a great extent.

RM is very modular with LOTS of classes and character customization. I would say that almost any archtype is open to you. What type are you looking for?

That's good to hear. From what it sounds like though, the Monk/Magent/Dabbler/Mystic and Rogue are what intrigues me the most, but there's no telling.

The archetype that interests me most is "Spy". Manipulative, charismatic, a master of subterfuge and tactics, but able to definitely open up a can of whoop-ass if he has the element of surprise, or picks the right battlefield with appropriate terrain. Having a pocket full of tricks is also useful. McGuyver + James Bond, or (to use a more magical reference) Johnny Constantine.

I imagine you could do this with mentalism too (Basically being The Shadow), or any other combination. It occurs to me that, due to the lethal potential of Rolemaster, what I might do is get two or three characters built, and have two in the pocket. Though, I'd worry that they'd be too dang similar to one another.

My biggest fear is trying to do too much, and thus not succeeding at doing anything.

[sblock="Related tangent"]There's a TV show called "Burn Notice" about a CIA spy who was outed. So he must do odd jobs while trying to find out who outed him/why/try to get back in. He's very sneaky/tricky, and uses techniques and jimmy-rigged tech (such as using tampered cellphones as bugs, making thermite and flash grenades from items at the grocery store, etc), as well as being good at deceiving. He rarely fights, and if so, it's very short, scrappy, "disable ASAP" type judo.

I would love playing this character. Naturally the technology isn't there, but a few clever uses of magic could facilitate it.

Sidenote: The show even has Bruce Campbell in it, and you can watch the episodes online here.[/sblock]

Other Archetypes I enjoy: The "Throw Anything"/Knife fighter (See: Riddick). The Support/Buffer (Your Dragon Shaman, Warlord, a Bard that doesn't suck), the Face man (although I like to contribute to combat too!), the Debuffer, and the Brick (Hellboy, Hercules, etc; can take punishment, and pummel/throw people around).

 

[SableWyvern]

Interesting. Does the Monk do any sort of body augmentation ("Congratulations, you're bulletproof for the next ten seconds" "Tada, I can walk through fire by just harnessing my chi")? Yogi/Mythical Chinese Martial Artist type stuff?

The default RMSS monk has the following base spell lists:

Body Reigns
Basic physical augmentations: strength, pain resistance, hostile environment capability

Body Renewal
Self-healing

Evasions
Dodging, acrobatic feats, speed

Mind Over Matter
Bonus unarmed damage, hardened body for improved armour, shattering solid objects with blows.

Monk's Bridge
Crazy movement skillz. Run on razors, water, breezes, up walls; leap huge distances.

Monk's Sense
Enhanced senses.

I wonder how the mentalism-monk in the monk book functions. Do they augment their attacks with telekinesis? Heh.

The Zen Monk has access to Body Renewal, Evasions, Body Control (Body Reigns renamed), Zen Awareness (Monk's Senses renamed) and Zen Focus (Mind Over Matter renamed) as well as Minds Shadw, which includes psychic awareness, control and reading spells as well as the ability to use psychic obfuscation to hide from single targets. The renamed lists include very minor differences from the regular lists. The other main difference is that default monks get access to Open and Closed Essence lists, whereas Zen Monks have access to Open and Closed Mentalism. Open lists are relatively cheap to learn, and available to all users of that power source. Closed lists are the same, but more powerful and expensive (in development point costs).

I do not know if he has the Monk companion, but he does have this book, and (Well he said "Arcane book"; it could've been the Arcane or Essence companion).

Well, that at least makes it sound like he's running RMSS, which means the info I've given you so far is fairly spot on.

What's the difference between these two guys? Because "magic using assassin" sounds really similar to "Magic using ninja", y'know? Both sound fairly appealing to me.

The Dabbler is more thiefy than fightery. He has lots of spells to help him sneak and hide, pick locks, that sort of thing. The Magent is the straight-up killer of the two, although there is overlap between the two professions.

Is this the "Speak to the dead, read tarot cards" type of "Information gathering", or something else? I always thought the "Medium" or Psychic type of magic user was a niche really missing from D&D.

Actually, I misguided you with the Mystic description. It's actually more about misdirecting and confusing opponents, and making modifications to the environment.

However, the Astrologer and Seer (non-core in RMSS) pretty much fits the bill for the character type you're talking about here. Additionally, there is the Divination skill, which covers all possible types of divination.

I notice there's no "Necromancer" or Voodoo Priest/Hexer. "Debuff" casters are appealing to me, but not to a great extent.

Oh, they are there, just not core. The Wizard from Arcane Companion is a straight-up magic defeater - he has spell lists specifically dedicated to defeating each of channeling, essence and mentalism. There is also an arcane Mage Hunter that is a semi-spell user who hunts and kills magic users. The Warlock is packed with curses and evil-eye spells.

Core also includes evil cleric lists that cover the creation and control of undead, and evil mentalist lists like "Mental Erosion" and "Mind Disease".

That's good to hear. From what it sounds like though, the Monk/Magent/Dabbler/Mystic and Rogue are what intrigues me the most, but there's no telling.

The archetype that interests me most is "Spy". Manipulative, charismatic, a master of subterfuge and tactics, but able to definitely open up a can of whoop-ass if he has the element of surprise, or picks the right battlefield with appropriate terrain. Having a pocket full of tricks is also useful. McGuyver + James Bond, or (to use a more magical reference) Johnny Constantine.

IIRC, Mentalists tend to have good costs for social skills, so I'd be looking at one of the Mentalism professions for this type of character.

My biggest fear is trying to do too much, and thus not succeeding at doing anything.

With the right profession, you can be very widely skilled in RM. A rogue can definitely concentrate on social skills. With semi-spell users, though, it's hard to learn a heap of spells. At lower levels, you may find yourself slightly worse off than a pure arms or spell user, but at higher levels you'll find you have a plethora of spells to enhance your core abilities, making you very powerful and versatile.

Other Archetypes I enjoy: The "Throw Anything"/Knife fighter (See: Riddick). The Support/Buffer (Your Dragon Shaman, Warlord, a Bard that doesn't suck), the Face man (although I like to contribute to combat too!), the Debuffer, and the Brick (Hellboy, Hercules, etc; can take punishment, and pummel/throw people around).

I think all of those are perfectly viable in RM.

 

[Zinovia]

Wearing armor in Rolemaster can be a good idea, but you don't have to go that route if you don't want to. Armor effectively acts as damage reduction, causing hits against you to be less severe than if you were unarmored. If you look at the tables, it's often easier to hit people wearing armor, but you only do small amounts of damage (and no crit) unless you get a very high hit roll. Unarmored people are harder to hit, but when you do hit them, you'll hit hard (and roll on the crit tables).

Unarmored charaacters often have a high defensive bonus to help them dodge, and everyone in Rolemaster parries attacks with part of their offensive bonus. Criticals are where the big damage comes into play, and can literally kill you in one unlucky hit. Or else they have effects like burning your arm, or making you bleed, or breaking bones. It all depends on what kind of weapon or spell is hitting you.

I like the division of magic in Rolemaster, but the way you learn spell lists is weird. It works, but I never much liked that aspect of the game. One thing to keep in mind with mentalism is that you can't wear a helm. There are some crit results that say you die if you aren't wearing a helm because it was a bad strike to the head. Those aren't all that common however.

Rolemaster is very simulationist. It has a lot of rules for most everything, but definitely is better for combat realism than D&D. Facing, parry, different weapon and armor characteristics, and different types of damage are all accounted for. The one thing it lacks (or did when I played it) is a called shot mechanic.

I played Rolemaster for over 10 years before giving up gaming for quite some time when our group moved away. We resumed with D&D because we wanted an easier system for a new player to pick up, but RM definitely has a lot to offer for those willing to try it. Lots of math - our players routinely used calculators. =) Enjoy your game.

 

[Rechan]

Thanks, Sable for answering my questions.

The default RMSS monk has the following base spell lists:

Interesting, nice. I presume you can only pick a few of these, then?

The Dabbler is more thiefy than fightery. He has lots of spells to help him sneak and hide, pick locks, that sort of thing. The Magent is the straight-up killer of the two, although there is overlap between the two professions.

Interesting. I'd lean more towards the Dabbler just out of taste, simply because I suspect he's better at the skulking. But hell, toss in some illusions, and you have the Beguiler (a class I thought was really great).

How is the Magent good at killing? I mean, not to get bogged down with rules, but how does he "work", so to speak? Just higher percentage on single-attacks, or "attacks from surprise"? And if he's magical, I presume his magic is pretty much "Useful for killing and being hidden"?

Actually, I misguided you with the Mystic description. It's actually more about misdirecting and confusing opponents, and making modifications to the environment.

Still not bad. I imagine they have illusions then. "Modifications to the environment", eh?

Oh, they are there, just not core. The Wizard from Arcane Companion is a straight-up magic defeater - he has spell lists specifically dedicated to defeating each of channeling, essence and mentalism. There is also an arcane Mage Hunter that is a semi-spell user who hunts and kills magic users. The Warlock is packed with curses and evil-eye spells.

Those sound more like only being able to take out other magic users. Here I was thinking just straight-up lowering the enemy's chances of defense or offense. Or putting negative status effects on them (Your slows, blindness, etc). That way if you're fighting Arms-types, you're not SOL.

With the right profession, you can be very widely skilled in RM. A rogue can definitely concentrate on social skills. With semi-spell users, though, it's hard to learn a heap of spells. At lower levels, you may find yourself slightly worse off than a pure arms or spell user, but at higher levels you'll find you have a plethora of spells to enhance your core abilities, making you very powerful and versatile.

Sounds like if you're going to be a semi-spell user, the best bet is to pick the most used spells, and then just branch out later. Which is a shame when it comes to versatility, but hey. The trick then, though, is deciding which is the "most used" versus excitement, like with the Monk.

Can semi-spell users get decent skills outside of spells? Or does most of the resources go into spells?

Out of curiosity, is there shapeshifting?

 

[SableWyvern]

Interesting, nice. I presume you can only pick a few of these, then?

As a semi-spell user, you can have anywhere from a smattering of spells through to a comprehensive collection. Your spells come from the same pool of points as your other skills, so you need to balance one against the other. Later on, when you start seeing diminished returns from skill increases, it becomes easier to find points for more spells.

How is the Magent good at killing? I mean, not to get bogged down with rules, but how does he "work", so to speak? Just higher percentage on single-attacks, or "attacks from surprise"? And if he's magical, I presume his magic is pretty much "Useful for killing and being hidden"?

He gets cheaper weapon skills than the Dabbler, and I dare say a bonus to his chosen weapon group. He has a Poison Mastery spell list, with obvious utility, and Assassin Mastery, which allows him to make "ambush" attacks without the normal requirements (kinda like D&D sneak attack) and gain bonuses to hit.

Still not bad. I imagine they have illusions then. "Modifications to the environment", eh?

They can manipulate liquids, solids and gases. Create walls, freeze/boil liquids, destroy material etc...

Sounds like if you're going to be a semi-spell user, the best bet is to pick the most used spells, and then just branch out later. Which is a shame when it comes to versatility, but hey. The trick then, though, is deciding which is the "most used" versus excitement, like with the Monk.

Can semi-spell users get decent skills outside of spells? Or does most of the resources go into spells?

See my comments above. Generally, my experience is that semis start with few, if any spells. As they level, spells become a bigger and bigger part of what they do. It's going to vary from character to character though. Certainly, they still need to develop skills, as many of their spells tend to enhance mundane ability. Generally, they tend to be slightly worse of than arms users when not using magic, and equal to or better than them when they are using their spells for enhancment. If you want to rely primarily on skills, though, you're much better of taking an arms-based profession.

Out of curiosity, is there shapeshifting?

I'm pretty sure Rangers and Animists get D&D style animal shapechanging. The Channeling Companion also offers a lot of animal shapechanging options. There are also lots of mimic and disguise spells scattered about.

Those sound more like only being able to take out other magic users. Here I was thinking just straight-up lowering the enemy's chances of defense or offense. Or putting negative status effects on them (Your slows, blindness, etc). That way if you're fighting Arms-types, you're not SOL.

Channeling definitely includes that kind of thing, and the Warlock specialises in it.

 

[Rechan]

He gets cheaper weapon skills than the Dabbler, and I dare say a bonus to his chosen weapon group. He has a Poison Mastery spell list, with obvious utility, and Assassin Mastery, which allows him to make "ambush" attacks without the normal requirements (kinda like D&D sneak attack) and gain bonuses to hit.

And the magic-related stuff?

See my comments above. Generally, my experience is that semis start with few, if any spells. As they level, spells become a bigger and bigger part of what they do. It's going to vary from character to character though. Certainly, they still need to develop skills, as many of their spells tend to enhance mundane ability. Generally, they tend to be slightly worse of than arms users when not using magic, and equal to or better than them when they are using their spells for enhancment. If you want to rely primarily on skills, though, you're much better of taking an arms-based profession.

So noted. You mentioned Mentalists get social stuff cheap, so one avenue of potential is going mentalist, picking up social stuff, and then trying to "Branch out". While they likely don't have many arms skills, I bet it's easier to supplement offensively with TK or something. A psychic ninja or spy. Since the Magent is an Essence class, who get social skills cheap, this might be a route to go.

General question now: What should be avoided? What are the common "Pit falls"?

 

[Treebore]

Its worth trying out. I don't know if you'll like it, but its worth trying.